


of whom the light is made

by boggyfroggy



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Avatar Zuko (Avatar), Blind Character, Blind Zuko (Avatar), Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Lucid Dreaming, Minor Character Death, Minor Original Character(s), Misunderstandings, Ozai (Avatar) Being a Terrible Parent, Zuko (Avatar)-centric, basically what happened when i said "what if i took... a bunch of aus... and stuck them together", bc its a zuko story, but i do also like zukka and kataang, first work in this fandom and its the most ambitious thing ive ever planned..., for fun, i dont have the heart to kill aang so he still got iceberged he just was never the avatar, largely gen bc i love friendship, no beta we die like men, so i may sprinkle in some bits for fun, somebody hand me the L, zuko is blind and also the avatar
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:41:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25931527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/boggyfroggy/pseuds/boggyfroggy
Summary: Zuko has been having this particular dream for a few months now, since his sixteenth birthday. He wakes up sitting in seiza, dark hair spilling free from his phoenix tail and falling haphazardly over his face, the swirling fog leaving freezing cold caresses around his knees and wrists.He can’t stand to keep his eyes open for long, not when he’s become so accustomed to seeing nothing at all. The colors give him a headache.At least it isn’t red, he thinks with a traitorous grimace.--Zuko was blinded in the Agni Kai against his father. He also just so happens to be the Avatar. Funny how these things work out.
Relationships: Aang & Zuko (Avatar), Iroh & Zuko (Avatar), The Gaang & Zuko (Avatar), Zuko & Zuko's Crew (Avatar)
Comments: 22
Kudos: 268





	of whom the light is made

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Air Currents](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25419382) by [Honorable_mention](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Honorable_mention/pseuds/Honorable_mention). 



> title from "to the fire" by w.s. merwin! 
> 
> also zuko has a full head of hair in this, not for any particular reason i just saw this art by @pakchoys on tumblr and thought it was neat: https://pakchoys.tumblr.com/post/622200986617937920/book-1-zuko-is-a-beautiful-bald-boy-but-what-if-he

Alone in a foggy blue void, Aang comes to with a gasp.

His first thought is that he must be dead; after all, his very last memory is of himself and Appa plunging deep into roiling, icy water. The realization sinks like lead in his chest. He’d had so much he still wanted to do-

_Appa._

Aang jolts and propels himself to his feet with a jet of air, looking around frantically for his beloved bison. 

“Hello? Hello?! Appa! Buddy, are you there?” He cups his hands around his mouth and shouts into the fog, hoping to any spirits who may be listening that Appa was alright. 

Hold on… what?

Aang pauses and looks down at his feet. He’d definitely just airbent, intentionally or not. He thought he heard from Monk Gyatso once that you couldn’t bend at all in the spirit world… if that was the case, then he must not be dead after all!

“Phew,” he breathes with a hand on his chest, feeling his heart rate return to a normal pace. He’s still worried sick about Appa, but he couldn’t have gotten far! He’s sure that his buddy will turn up eventually.

So that’s one mystery solved. But the question remained - if this isn’t the spirit world, then where in the world is he?

\--

In the year 0 AG, as Sozin’s comet raged in the sky, a little girl with blue eyes brighter than the tribe had ever seen was born in the North Pole. She was named Yuna, after her grandmother on her mother’s side.

She was a precocious young girl, with long dark hair and a bright smile filled to the brim with curiosity and ambition. Her older brother was a waterbender, and she often snuck herself into the training grounds to watch him practice, hidden securely within a nearby snowdrift. Back at home, she’d climb out of bed in the middle of the night, pull on her favorite fur coat, and trudge out into the snow to mimic what she’d seen her brother do.

Without a master, the little girl’s practice yielded few results at first - not a drop of water seemed to budge, no matter how emphatic her movements. Yuna continued her daily escapades, determined to study every waterbender she could find. She wanted nothing more than to be able to move the water like she knew she could, to answer the call of Tui she felt growing stronger each passing day. It was as if she could feel the push and pull of the tide within herself, coming in and out with each and every breath.

One day, at seven years old, she finally managed it.

It was a measly thing, just an inch-thick globe of water hovering above the palm of her tiny hand, but it was _waterbending_. Seized with joy, Yuna raced as fast as she could to find her mother, while also being mindful of the water held delicately between her hands. It may have been small, but to the little girl, the timid, wavering ball felt as vast as every inch of La’s domain and more.

Upon seeing the girl’s momentous achievement, her mother’s face broke out into a proud, joyful smile, wide to match her daughter’s own.

“That’s amazing, Yuna! If you’d like, we can get you started in the healing huts as soon as tomorrow.”

Yuna’s eyebrows furrowed. Why would she want to go to the healing huts? Her brother never trained there - she figured they would be too cramped for proper waterbending, anyway. When she relayed as such to her mother, the smile on the woman’s face remained, but seemed to dampen.

“Don’t be silly. Little girls can’t train with Master Kanaaq - it’s improper, and much too dangerous. But you’ll be able to learn healing, just like me! Doesn’t that sound grand?”

The following tantrum resulted in the girl and her mother being buried to their necks in slush.

Years passed, and Yuna found she didn’t like healing very much. She understood its importance, and she tried very hard to force herself to like it, but it just never called to her. Not like what she’d seen her brother do, all those years ago. Eventually, she simply couldn’t take it anymore - she abandoned her patient, splashing water all over his face, and stormed out of the tent never to return.

Tui’s light shone down upon her, and Yuna turned her face away.

She never waterbent again.

The little girl, now a grown woman, never forgot the pull she felt towards the water. How could she, when it had only grown stronger with age? She felt it constantly, lapping at her frozen heart like the tide along the icy Antarctic shores. She had tried to harden herself against it, to block out the constant rushing of water within her, to keep it locked behind the tightest dam in the North Pole where not a single drop could squeeze through the cracks. 

But she could never truly forget the joy she’d felt that day when she was seven, standing alone with only the snow for company. Gazing with undisguised wonder at the little ball of life held between her ungloved palms. She wondered if she’d ever feel that free again.

Avatar Yuna of the Northern Water Tribe died on a blustery Arctic winter’s night after giving birth to a healthy baby girl, the youngest of her four children. No one noticed how the earth, buried deep beneath layers of ice and snow, cracked and shivered with each of her screams until she finally fell silent.

\--

The void is very quiet, Aang notices.

He’s not sure what else he was expecting. At least _some_ kind of noise - the rustling of leaves, howling wind, spirits, he’d even take a low ominous hum over this deafening silence. He’s just not _used_ to quiet. Back at the temple, there’d always be some group of people nearby chattering amongst themselves, or some baby sky bison tottering around. He’d never felt this lonely in his life.

There’s not even a way of keeping track of time here. Aang couldn’t have been hanging out in this blue nothing for longer than ten minutes at least, but it felt like it could’ve been hours. Years, even. He’s not sure if time is somehow distorted here, or if it’s just his own boredom; the Spirits knew sometimes morning meditation could feel the same way. 

Finding himself getting restless just standing there and feeling the cold fog lick at his ankles, Aang decides the best course of action is to start walking. Maybe there’ll be something up ahead! Just because he can’t see anything doesn’t mean it isn’t there; maybe the fog’s just that thick. Or it’s really far away.

Really, really… really far away.

Aang sighs, giving himself a full-body shake to snap himself out of the sudden funk. Gyatso was always telling him that exercise was good for both the mind and the body! He steels himself with a deep breath, puffing out his cheeks and his chest, and lets it out in a long, familiar jet of air.

It’s the only sound for what seems like miles.

Aang starts walking.

\--

In the year 58 AG, a twelve-year-old girl skips jovially through the halls of her manor in the Upper Ring of Ba Sing Se. She giggles as she turns a corner, long braid swishing behind her, and almost smashes right into a passing servant.

“Oops - sorry! Coming through!” The girl laughs, picks up a fallen teacup from the ground (good thing these things are made of stone), and places it back onto the servant boy’s tray before taking off once more.

Her name was Li Xia, and she didn’t have a care in the world. Not even the slightest worry - her mother said that worrying causes wrinkles.

Not that there was anything to be worried about. Because of course, there was no war in Ba Sing Se.

Naturally.

Li Xia lived the first 26 years of her life in total isolation from the outside world. She rarely left her house, and even when she did, she wasn’t allowed anywhere outside the Upper Ring. 

Her parents told her it was to protect her. She didn’t understand what from, though. After all, everything in Ba Sing Se was perfect; not a shred of violence to be seen. 

That was true, for the most part. There was nearly no violence anywhere within the walls of Ba Sing Se. The Dai Li made sure of that.

The same could not be said for beneath.

  
Li Xia was an artistic sort. She was an earthbender - and a darn good one, too, if you asked her - and she took more joy than anything in using her bending for sculpture. She loved extending her senses deep within the mound of clay beneath her hands, imagining all of the things it could become, and then _shaping it_ , her hands merely a guideline for the earth molding itself for her.

Her parents often scolded her for sneaking clay into her rooms and making a mess, but they couldn’t really do much about it, as she was perfectly capable of cleaning up after herself. Earthbending came in handy, they supposed.

As she grew older, her passion for her art only increased. She would spend hours shut up in the studio her parents had built for her, thinking of nothing but the feel of the earth beneath her skillful fingers. One day, she had been up working long into the moonless night, relying on candles to see instead of the usual moonlight she kept streaming through her window. She had turned 26 just a few days ago, and she had more new clay than she knew what to do with. It simply wouldn’t do to let it sit.

Halfway through the process, Li Xia became overexcited and accidentally pulled the clay too far, breaking off a piece. She dropped the clay and huffed in frustration, waving a hand to lump it all back together and start again.

Or, she would have, if her attention had not been grabbed by the sudden flaring of the candlelight around her as the huff of air left her lungs.

She made a confused noise in the back of her throat, clay entirely forgotten as she leant forward to eye the candle closest to her. Now that she was paying attention to it… it seemed to shrink as she inhaled and grow as she exhaled, as if she were literally breathing life into it. Li Xia stared transfixed into the flame.

A tingle of energy danced across her fingertips as she reached out to it, fingers just shy of brushing the flickering edge of the little fire. It felt almost as if it were an extension of her body, an extra limb that she could feel pulsing with life. 

For a moment, Li Xia forgot herself enough to grasp the flame entirely, pulling it into the palm of her hand with a gentle tug from her chi. The fear of being burned only came to her a second afterwards, and the flame pulsed with the leap of her heartbeat, but it did not hurt her. She cupped it gingerly between her hands, watching it move in time with her breath, letting the warmth of it heat her body and soothe her spirit. It was… the only way to describe it was... _magical._

She remained like that for a few moments more before her attention was snagged by the faint sound of scuffing boots outside her window. She turned abruptly, letting the flame go out as she did so, but there was no one there.

The Dai Li took her before the sun had a chance to rise.

No one quite knew what had happened to young Li Xia. The story went that she had been snatched up by a spirit, for reasons unknown - it was the only way to describe the utter lack of a trace she’d left behind. It was like she had vanished into thin air; when her studio was searched the next day, every candle but one was still lit. 

Earthquakes became an unexpected problem in Ba Sing Se for the following twelve years. As did reports of terrible screaming coming from the bottom of Lake Laogai. Locals suggested that Li Xia had been taken by a dark spirit, but no amount of warding or attempts at appeasement would make the screaming stop.

Avatar Li Xia of the Earth Kingdom burnt herself alive at age thirty-eight after twelve years of brainwashing and imprisonment. No one ever heard from her again.

\-- 

It feels like he’s been walking for a hundred years. Aang huffs his four thousand, three-hundred and fifty third sigh since he began walking; he knows because he’s been counting. He’s resorting to basically anything to keep himself entertained. There’s only so much of the color blue one boy can take without finding himself going a little stir-crazy.

Aang kicks absently at the fog, willing it to part before him. It doesn’t budge. Which is really, really weird, considering… hello, airbending? No amount of blasting air all over the place is even able to slightly disturb it. It makes him feel like it’s not even really there.

He can’t help but think of the people he left behind when he ran away. Monk Gyatso, for one, has to be worried sick. And… Jinpa. His best friend, Jinpa. He was meant to be Jinpa’s counsel, his right hand man, and he just... left. 

It’s not his fault he got caught in that storm, though! He was just planning on hanging out with his friends in the Southern Water Tribe for a bit, to clear his head. It’s just that… they were going to send Jinpa away.

They were going to send him away, and it was all Aang’s fault. 

The fog remains undisturbed.

Aang is getting a little bit tired of being the only thing around that makes sense. He wishes he had Appa to talk to.

A long, long, long while later, Aang is on his six thousand five hundred and twenty eighth sigh, and he’s resorted to performing a rousing monologue of everything he remembers from seeing _Love Amongst the Dragons_ with Kuzon a couple months ago. He thinks he’s doing pretty well, despite not knowing most of the lines, and the lack of response from his audience of fog. If he looks closely enough, Aang thinks he can see the outlines of little faces in the fog. He’s decided to name them all Bonzo.

Maybe he’s not holding up as well as he thought. 

Aang is well on his way to sigh number six thousand five hundred and twenty nine when, just out of the corner of his eye, he spots something that makes his heart begin to beat a million miles a minute. Amongst the overwhelming sea of cloudy sapphire blue, he spots a flash of red.

He squints a little, trying to get a better look at whatever it is - it looks like a boy, maybe a couple years older than Aang, with glossy black hair falling loose and messy about his face. Fire Nation, he guesses. 

He’s sprinting toward the boy before he can even think twice about it.

\--

In the year that would later become known as 0 AG, Avatar Jinpa was twelve years old. He was twelve years old, and his best friend had gone missing, and the Fire Nation was on its way. 

They had been training him for this for months, but he felt in no way prepared for what was to come. The Fire Nation army was coming to their doorstep. And for what? Revenge? They had already killed Avatar Roku - that’s what Roku told him, anyway - and it wasn’t Jinpa’s fault he was reincarnated. The monks had always taught him that holding grudges hurt nobody but oneself. 

He wished Aang was here. The boy had an effortless way of cheering people up, with his boundless optimism and lopsided, goofy grin. The two of them had practically been inseparable since birth. Surely, Aang would know exactly what to say to give Jinpa the motivation he so desperately needed.

At the same time, though, Jinpa was almost glad that Aang _wasn’t_ here. He could only hope that his best friend was okay - that the Fire Nation hadn’t found him already. But Aang was strong - he’d earned his airbending master tattoos already, after all, and Jinpa hadn’t - and he was resourceful, even if he didn’t look it. He stood a good chance at surviving, Jinpa thought.

He felt terrible about it, but yes - he was glad that Aang wasn’t here. At least now, he didn’t have to worry about him getting caught up in all of… this. Of him seeing what Jinpa had to do. What he had to sacrifice in order to defend his people.

Jinpa was twelve years old, but he’d never felt older.

Avatar Jinpa of the Air Nomads went down in a blaze of glory, defending a group of young children alongside his mentor, Gyatso, from the Fire Nation soldiers. Even with the full might of the Avatar, it wasn’t enough to protect them.

The Avatar State died down just in time as Jinpa was struck by a blast of fire. To every onlooker, it seemed as though it had not died down at all.

The Avatar Cycle was declared broken. The Avatar was declared vanquished for eternity. 

The world mourned.

\--

Alone in a foggy blue void, Prince Zuko squints against the sudden light.

These dreams are getting very irritating. It’s been three years since the last time he truly saw much of anything,

_(three years since the Agni Kai, three years since his punishment, three years since his father cupped his face with one hand and swung down a blaze of fire with the other-)_

so he’d really appreciate it if his subconscious could stop taunting him with the illusion of full sight. Especially if all it was going to show him was such a garish blue. 

Back when he was thirteen, when the injury was fresh, his dreams were all in color. They were never anything good - always replaying the events of _that day_ over and over again, assaulting him with vibrant sickening reds and pallid golds and the ever-so-slight glint of _satisfaction_ in his father’s eye before the world went dark. As the years went by, one by one, those blood-red nightmares were replaced with a welcome, soothing darkness.

All except this one.

Zuko has been having this particular dream for a few months now, since his sixteenth birthday. He wakes up sitting in _seiza_ , dark hair spilling free from his phoenix tail and falling haphazardly over his face, the swirling fog leaving freezing cold caresses around his knees and wrists. 

He can’t stand to keep his eyes open for long, not when he’s become so accustomed to seeing nothing at all. The colors give him a headache.

At least it isn’t red, he thinks with a traitorous grimace.

These dreams have been going on for almost three months now, and they seem to get longer each time. Zuko has discovered that absolutely no amount of pinching himself or otherwise causing himself bodily harm is able to wake him up, despite being aware that it is a dream the entire time. So he just has to sit there in the fog and wait for it to be over. 

Most of the time, if he keeps his eyes closed, it isn’t so bad. But he still can’t seem to shake the feeling that despite the vast, soul-crushing loneliness, he isn’t truly alone.

Zuko grumbles a string of irritated curses to himself and flops onto his back, content to let himself sink into the cool blanket of fog. Slowly, he feels his false consciousness begin to waver, the edges of his mind becoming fuzzy as he begins to wake-

_Tap tap tap tap tap tap tap taptaptaptaptaptaptap_

There’s footsteps.

Very _fast_ footsteps. And they’re coming right for him. Zuko shoots upright, halfway to his feet when whatever it is decides to speak.

“Hey! Over there!” The source of the footsteps shouts, sounding for all the world like he was sent by the Great Spirits themselves specifically to make Zuko’s life harder. They’re young, he can tell - not possibly older than, like, ten or something. He feels the voice’s heat signature closing the distance as he settles back into _seiza_. “Well, flameo, hotman!”

_This is going to be a long one, isn’t it,_ Zuko thinks, as the voice loudly plonks itself down in front of him.

“You honestly have _no_ idea how happy I am to see you! Well, not that I know you or anything, ‘cause I don’t, but I’ve been hanging out here for literally ever and you’re the first other person I’ve seen! What’s your name? Mine’s Aang. I’m an Air Nomad, not that it isn’t obvious, but still,” the voice chirps, wiggling excitedly in place.

An… air nomad? Why would Zuko be dreaming about an air nomad? The last he’d heard about the Air Nomads was from some lesson back at the palace about their savage ways and subsequent grand defeat at the hands of Fire Lord Sozin one hundred years ago.

Zuko is not entirely sure how he feels about that lesson now. He doesn’t doubt what the palace tutors told him, _of course_ he doesn’t -

_( - but the skull at the air temple had been so small, it fit so horrifyingly delicately between his hands there’s no way this belonged to anyone older than ten years old - )_

\- because believing anything else would be nothing short of treason. He has no reason to doubt anything.

No reason at all.

“Hey, um, you are alive, right? You’re not, like, a hallucination or something? ‘Cause I’d really love to have somebody to talk to that isn’t all in my head. Hellooooooo?” The airbender waves a hand in front of Zuko’s face.

Zuko shakes the treasonous line of thought out of his head and allows himself one (1) facepalm. As a treat.

“Yes, I’m alive. And you’re irritating.”

“No, silly, I’m Aang!” the airbender declares. Zuko can practically feel the boy’s grin radiating towards him, it’s that potent. He doesn’t doubt that if he opened his eyes, he’d quickly be blinded for a second time. “And you are?”

Zuko purses his lips, pondering his answer. He ponders for all of three seconds before deciding on his answer.

“None of your business,” he snipes, barely holding back the instinctual smirk when he feels the airbender deflate.

“Aw, come on. I told you mine, it’s only fair!” 

“I didn’t _ask_ for your name, you gave it freely. I owe you nothing.” Zuko huffed, crossing his arms tightly against his chest. He wasn’t sure why he was being so petulant with this airbender his mind had decided to conjure up. Perhaps because he’d been so close to waking up before the Dream World’s Biggest Annoyance decided to show up and ruin things. 

But then again… was it really so bad to keep dreaming for just a little while longer? At the very least, the dreamscape smelled better than the _Wani_.

“...Ugh, fine,” he began hesitantly, interrupting whatever slew of garbage the boy had decided to launch into while Zuko had been lost in thought, “it’s Zuko. Are you happy?” 

“As a matter of fact, yes, I am!” chimed the illusory airbender, with such self-satisfied cheer that Zuko immediately regretted ever even opening his mouth. The child scooted up next to him, nudging his shoulder against Zuko’s own. “Sooooooo… have you ever been to Omashu? Because I have the _funniest_ story. Basically what happened was, I was visiting my friend Bumi and-”

...Zuko wonders if it’s too late to try pinching himself awake again.

\--

Eighty-four years after the genocide of the Air Nomads, as a woman sequestered beneath Ba Sing Se succumbs to smoke, a sickly baby boy with piercing golden eyes claws his way from the ash. 

His exhausted mother holds him tight against her bosom, defending the babe with near animalistic desperation as the nurses fret about her. Trying to _take_ him from her. Rain lashes at the windows quick as the woman’s tongue, insults sizzling through the air like the lightning crashing in the distance. Can’t they see that he needs her, he’s so _small_ and so, so pale and she needs to _protect him -_

“Your Highness, please! He could die!”

That gets through to her, cutting sharply through the clouding of her mind like a fire-knife through stone. The new mother blinks, letting her thoughts come back to her. Her vice-like grip on the still-too-quiet newborn loosens.

“I- yes, of course, I’m… I’m so sorry. I don’t know what came over me,” she admits, as some of the tension leaves her body. Despite this, her brows remain furrowed, and her eyes never leave her baby, watching desperately for each rise and fall of his little chest.

_He’s too_ pale, she thinks, _not at all how a baby should be._ The worry crowds her mind like water rushing through the hull of a sinking ship. She stalls for just a moment, feather-light touch just barely grazing the top of his tiny head as she brushes back a little tuft of black hair, before finally relinquishing the babe into the arms of one terrified nurse. She will not let her own hesitation take this baby from her. Not when he is all she has.

The next few hours are absolute torture. The baby has been taken from the room, for the palace healers to look over, and the woman is not allowed to leave her bed. The birthing process was difficult, yes, and she must preserve her strength, she _knows_ this - but every second spent away from her son is pure agony. She is listless as the nurses look over her, exhaustion seeping deep into the marrow of her bones. All she can think about is her son.

Part of her is bitter, bitter that the circumstances of her first child’s birth have to be this way. Spent exhausted, bloodied and alone, missing her child so much it aches, with only the presence of equally-exhausted nurses for company. Her husband still has not come to visit. She knows to expect him - he’ll want to be present for the naming of his firstborn son, at least - but doubts that he will stay for very long.

She hates him, she thinks. Her husband knows it, has known since their wedding night. It means nothing to him. It’s almost a relief, that way - despite her love for the theatre, she does not know if she could ever pretend to love him. She is not that good an actress.

The newborn boy is returned to his mother’s arms a few minutes later. She holds him close, whispering her adoration for the tiny thing into the air like a prayer to Agni. Her husband comes in for a moment and, to her surprise, asks to hold him. The affection in his russet eyes as he looks down at his son is almost surreal, an expression she has never seen on her husband’s face before. A genuine smile makes him look… silly. Or perhaps she is still a bit tired. Either way, it startles a soft laugh out of her.

“What are you thinking?” she asks, in a moment of uncharacteristic daring.

“He will be a powerful firebender,” the man replies, “I can see it. He has my grandfather’s eyes.”

“I am glad to hear it,” says the woman. She does not know whether to be worried or relieved. Perhaps both. The feeling mixes in her stomach like her mother’s poison.

“What will his name be?” Prince Ozai of the Fire Nation asks his wife.

“I was thinking… Zuko. After my father,” Princess Ursa of the Fire Nation replies.

“So it shall be,” says Ozai, and hands the newly-christened baby back to Ursa. His fingers graze her own, and she does her best to contain the instinctual recoil. “I eagerly await his first spark.”

As he leaves, Ursa’s tense body sags with relief, and she looks her baby in the eyes. They truly are striking. A beautiful, vibrant gold - Ursa can practically feel the warmth radiating from them. A dragon’s eyes. 

What did Ozai see in them? Power? If so… whose power? The boy’s?

Or Ozai’s own?

“Zuko… my precious Zuko. I will protect you,” swears Ursa, as the storm outside finally dies out. The last pitter-patter of rain drops away from the windows, and as the first rays of Agni’s light break the horizon, Avatar Zuko of the Fire Nation begins to cry.

The howling wind is chalked up to a remnant of the storm, and nothing more.

\--

“-and then the three of us went hurtling straight into the cabbage stand! The whole thing was destroyed! I felt so bad, and Kuzon was still totally covered in candle wax, and the entire street smelled like wolverine-skunk! Not to mention Bumi was still trying to get out from under the pile of ocean kumquats the restaurant staff had dropped on him! Jinpa was laughing so hard, you should’ve been there!”

Zuko… well, he’ll be honest, he has no flaming idea what’s going on anymore. He zoned out halfway through the story, and is at this point too afraid to ask for clarification. 

This dream-airbender is strange, to say the least. Zuko is fairly certain that dreams are meant to have at least _some_ significance to the dreamer’s life, or at least some kind of symbolism that reflects it. He remembers Uncle finding a series of scrolls about the subject a few months back, and insisting on reading them to Zuko any chance he could get. 

Zuko isn’t sure whether that was out of pity, or just another weird Uncle instinct that Zuko doesn’t understand. He kind of regrets not paying any closer attention to them now.

The last time Zuko thought about the Air Nomads was back at the beginning of his banishment - back when he still believed there may be a chance to return home. He’d been delusional then; blinded by ambition, by pain and his desire to prove himself. Zuko had dragged Uncle and his crew all the way around the world for an entire year, scouring anywhere and everywhere that the Avatar might be. 

He thought that maybe his father knew something about the Avatar that the rest of the world didn’t. That somehow, the reports of the Avatar cycle being broken forever were wrong, and his family had kept it a secret for almost a hundred years. Zuko hadn’t been quite sure why Sozin would lie about something like that, but he must have had a good reason, because he was an honorable man doing what was right for the world. 

Zuko spent the entire first year of his banishment hoping against hope, the only thing holding him together being the knowledge that his father would never banish him without giving him a chance to come back. There had to be a way.

It turns out, when your father sends you away from your country and tells you your only way home is to capture a long-deceased historical figure whose death was witnessed by an entire army, it means you aren’t supposed to come back.

The entirety of the Fire Nation must have been laughing at him. The failure prince, chasing a delusion. Clinging to a lifeline made of broken glass and wondering why his hands were bleeding. Branded, blinded, and cast away for his weakness, and still having the audacity to believe he still deserved to come home.

Zuko wishes he could go back in time and punt his younger self over the side of the _Wani._ Self care, he thinks wryly. Uncle would approve.

He’s jerked very abruptly out of his self-deprecating reverie by a tap on his shoulder.

“Soooo, how’d you end up… here? Wherever here is? I ran away from the Air Temple, got lost in a storm, and lost my sky bison. I hope he’s okay...” Oh, yeah. Right. The dream airbender. The airbender specifically conjured up to be in Zuko’s weird ass recurring dream, for some reason. That airbender. Who also has not at all questioned the fact that Zuko has had his eyes closed this whole time, which is weird, but Zuko isn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth. ...Figuratively speaking.

“I went to sleep and now I’m here. Duh,” Zuko scoffs. Honestly, shouldn’t a product of his subconscious know this? 

“Oh. Cool! I’m glad you didn’t also get sucked into a big storm. That would really suck,” says the airbender, idly rocking back and forth on his heels. “And also be a really weird coincidence.”

There’s a beat.

“You’re sure you didn’t get all stormed up?”

“Agni above, _yes,_ I’m sure! Unless a storm snuck up on us and my ship capsized in the middle of the night.”

“Your ship? You’re a sailor? That’s awesome, what’s your ship’s name?” 

“The _Wani._ Wait, why am I telling you-”

“Wow, amazing! I’ve never heard of it, but it sounds cool!” 

“It sucks, actually. But thanks.”

“Oh.” God, why is Zuko so bad at this? And more importantly, why in the world does he care? 

“Well, you should come to visit the Southern Air Temple sometime! We’re always open to visitors,” continued the airbender, whose name Zuko most certainly was told but he cannot for the life of him remember. “Though I can’t guarantee you won’t get pied. Monk Gyatso has his own way of welcoming travelers.”

“...Pied?” Zuko hazards, an odd feeling of dread creeping up his throat.

“Oh, nothing. You’ll just have to come visit to find out!”

Hmm. Well, color him terrified. Zuko’s tempted to just zone out again to try and wake up, but there’s something bothering him about this whole thing. He figures if he’s gonna be stuck here, he might as well ask some questions of his own. Right?

“I thought you said you ran away from the air temple? If it’s such a great place, why’d you leave?”

The airbender (Agni, what did he say his name was? It started with a vowel - Ong??? No, that doesn’t sound right - ) seems to shrink a little at that. 

“Well, um… it’s not like I was planning on never coming back! I just got really upset and I had to… I dunno, clear my head.”

Spirits, is Zuko really starting to sympathize with this imaginary dream-kid? There’s gotta be something wrong with him. Still, he forges on.

“What happened?” Does he look appropriately sympathetic? Is it possible to look appropriately sympathetic with your eyes closed? Is having your eyes closed all the time like, a thing in Air Nomad culture, or is this kid just a total airhead, no pun intended?

The kid in question hangs his head low with hunched shoulders. “It’s just… Avatar stuff. They were gonna send my best friend away.”

Wait, what?

“...Avatar stuff?” Zuko’s eyes snap open beyond his volition. He’s greeted by the sight of a sheepish young boy with a bald head and bright blue arrow tattoos. Nearly exactly what he’d imagined, but somehow now it matters so much more. 

“Yeah. But it- it wasn’t his fault! And I don’t think being the avatar means you can’t have any friends! Right? I’m sure Avatar Kyoshi had friends!” the airbender continues, clearly not noticing how the boy across from him has suddenly gone still as a statue.

“You- you’re the _avatar?_ ” Zuko is sure he’d be setting the ground on fire if there was any real ground to speak of. “But the avatar’s been… but you were…!”

“What? Uh, wait, hold on -”

Zuko, unfortunately, does not manage to get any answers to his frantic questions, because the dreamscape chooses this exact moment to have an earthquake. 

The very foundation of the realm begins to shake violently, tossing the two boys around like a couple of ragdolls. The faux ground chips and falls away, leaving a patchwork assortment of gaping holes, fog seeping out and away through them to reveal nothing but endless black void below. 

The airbender (the _avatar,_ the _AVATAR_ ) is screaming, Zuko realizes, and maybe Zuko is too, but his mind is too busy reeling to care. He’s buffeted around as reality itself crumbles around him, and his shoulder collides painfully with a sharp _crack_ with the falling ground before he is bounced over the side of the chasm and he falls and falls and _falls_ as the darkness swallows him up once more.

\--

Zuko wakes up with a start, back into a world of familiar nothing. It’s not nearly as comforting as it usually is.

That was- that was the _avatar._ He’d been speaking with the _Agni-damned AVATAR._

But that didn’t make any sense! The avatar has been dead for a _hundred years_ . Even if he _did_ manage to survive the genocide of the Air Nomad people, and the entire Fire Nation army who claimed to witness his death during the Avatar State were somehow incorrect about the whole endeavor, he would have to be a withered old man by now!

Maybe… maybe it was just a dream. An incredibly bizarre, unnecessarily vivid dream that probably meant nothing, except the fact that Zuko was finally starting to go insane cooped up on this smelly, cramped, run-down excuse for a ship.

He slows his breathing to a deliberate, controlled pace. It was just a dream. Zuko exhales deeply, letting his heat-sense wash over his surroundings. There’s been a little nest of rabbit-mice in the walls of his bedroom for a few months now, and he’s not super sure where they came from, but he made it his mission to befriend them out of sheer boredom. The mother had babies a few weeks ago, and Zuko was given the honor of being allowed to pet them. He gave them all little names, too, but he’d sooner leap overboard before letting anybody else know. Zuko focuses on their tiny, wriggling heat signatures and allows himself to relax, just a little.

Crewman Sei and Crewwoman Haruka are sparring above deck, he can tell, via their elevated body heat and racing hearts. Engineer Mikan is milling about in the boiler room, her inner flame licking steadily as she focuses on her latest repairs. Helmsman Juuzo is having a spirited conversation with Uncle Iroh, probably over tea. Lieutenant Jee is looking over the maps. Everything is as it should be.

It’s almost noon, Zuko realizes, as he centers his breathing enough to focus on the position of the sun above him. That’s… odd. He should’ve woken with the sunrise like he usually does, or at least been woken by his uncle for morning meditation. Was he really that deeply asleep?

“I knew I shouldn’t have let Uncle drag me into music night,” Zuko grumbles, crawling out of bed and pulling on the robes he’d set out the night before. “Crewwoman Chizu’s terrible tsungi horn technique is giving me nightmares.”

The state of relative relaxation Zuko has allowed himself to lapse into lasts only for a few more seconds, before a sudden blast of pure energy from somewhere over the horizon nearly knocks him over.

It’s an assault on his senses. His entire body is filled with nothing but _heat_ and something else he can’t seem to name, sending his inner flame totally askew. He clatters into the wall to catch himself before he hits the ground. 

_What was THAT?_

Zuko rights himself and takes off, not even bothering with his armor in his mad dash to the deck above. He nearly slams right into Crewwoman Chizu on his way, and he sends an apologetic “watch it” at her affronted squawk. He has the layout of these halls completely memorized, so as long as he watches out for any approaching heat signatures, he makes it up unscathed.

Ever one for dramatic entrances, Zuko slams the door to the deck open with the force of a thousand suns. He’s certain he must look like a disaster - robes mussed, chest heaving, and in his hurry having forgone his usual dignified phoenix tail in exchange for a messy black mop falling all over his face like a crazy person. He can’t bring himself to care.

“What in the world was that? You all felt that, didn’t you?” He demands to the shell-shocked crew. Uncle Iroh stands to put a hand on his shoulder.

“There was a light over the horizon, nephew, that is all. The south pole is quite known for its celestial happenings.” Iroh sounds… apprehensive. About what, Zuko doesn’t know. He growls in frustration.

“That was _not_ just any ‘celestial happening.’ I could feel it from my room. Whatever it was, it was powerful.” 

First that dream, and now this? It couldn’t be a coincidence. There’s absolutely no way.

But is Zuko really that lucky?

“Head a course for the light,” Zuko orders. When he doesn’t feel anybody making a move, he stomps his foot hard, letting loose a stream of fire from his nostrils. “Now!”

That gets people moving. Zuko shrugs his uncle’s hand off his shoulder and goes to stand at the bow of the ship. He can’t see the view, of course, but the feeling of the cold antarctic wind whipping at his face is oddly centering. He clutches at the railing hard enough that he’s sure his knuckles are turning white.

Uncle stands beside him. “Prince Zuko, are you sure we should be acting so quickly? It may be nothing after all. I just don’t want you to get your hopes up, like the last time.”

“This is nothing like last time, Uncle! I have to find out what the source of that energy was.” That feels like a bit of an understatement. It’s more like if Zuko doesn’t get to the source of that energy blast in the next 0.3 seconds, he’s going to burst into flames. Uncle Iroh seems to pick up on that.

“It has been a while since I’ve seen you so… spirited, my nephew.”

“You didn’t feel it, uncle! Not like I did. It was like it was… calling to me. I need to know.”

“If you feel so strongly about it, Prince Zuko, then I will trust your judgment. But be careful, alright?”

“Obviously, uncle. You don’t need to tell me that every time.”

“Ah, but I think I do. Just like I think I need to fix your hair! You look like you’ve got a nest of sparrowkeets living in there!” He says with a chuckle. Zuko groans.

“Ugh, fine. But be gentler with it, okay? You always brush it like you’re trying to rip it out of my skull.”

“I make no promises, nephew. Perhaps if you would remember to brush it more often, I would not have to work so hard!”

Zuko trades banter with his uncle for a little while longer as Helmsman Juuzo changes course, but his thoughts are entirely elsewhere. Is he really this lucky? Enough for the long-dead Avatar to just… show up right next to him in the middle of the South Pole?

But… there’s nothing else it could have been. He felt that burst of energy. It was like it was trying to tear his inner fire right out of his chest. 

Zuko had lost all hope of returning home two years ago. But if he’s right about this, and the airbending Avatar is somehow alive… he might just have a chance after all.

He’s going to show his father that he _is_ worthy of his title of Crown Prince. He’s going to prove everyone wrong. No matter what it takes.

The wind howls and the sea rocks violently beneath the _Wani_ with every seething breath Zuko takes. Being blind, the young prince doesn’t notice a thing.

Miles away, surrounded by ice and snow and freezing water, a young airbender wakes up.

**Author's Note:**

> so... i hope u enjoyed the prologue! i've got a whole lot planned for this story and im super excited to get into it! updates may be sporadic bc im starting college in a few days, but im super passionate about this idea so im excited to get more out! until next time!! <3


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